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THE Conventional FINAL DAY … I ran out of space yesterday, so I couldn’t list the individual category winners of the new Danish science fiction award, The Niels Klim Award. The winners were: Best novella (tie): Alastair Reynolds for “Skjul” (Hideaway) and “Minlas blomster” (Minla’s Flowers) from Vejen mellem stjernerne (both translated by Niels Dalgaard). Best novelette: A. Silvestri for “Faderens sønner” from Faderens sønner. Best short story THE (tie): Michael Kamp for “Homo Arachnida” and Lars Ahn Pedersen for “En helt almindelig død”, both from Den nye koloni – Lige under overfladen 5. CONventional Also I missed telling about the traditional auction on the Saturday. In the month leading up to Fantasticon, different items are donated or arranged for a 50/50 sale, etc. The huge amounts of books inserted into the FANTASTICON 2012, Fandom Market by Morten “Not MARVEL” mentioned yesterday, has for the past years dominated this auction. Copenhagen, Denmark Author sets and assortments of paperback books has filled up, along the usual DVDs , comics, etc. This year was no different. As per tradition, Klaus Æ. Mortensen (who informs me that he is a futurist, not a futurologist as I wrote yesterday), lead the auction. And as usual he Knud Larn, June 3rd, 2012 could (and did) talk about every single title much longer than needed, so people wanting to buy sits frustrated waiting for the opportunity to give a bid… But then published in two volumes. Naturally such a mammoth again, he probably talks higher prices into us by exactly book scares most reviewers, and Niels Dalgaard who doing it this way Also let us not forget that such had been asked to read and comment on it, were not that introductions are the very thing that neofans need to enthusiastic about it, in his opinion it had two flaws: Too secretly learn and understand why this book is a classic long, and too uneventful in it’s prose. The time travel worth reading! Naturally we also had a big banquet part in them described all the problems which have Saturday evening, but since nothing (except food, drink, already been discussed in sf. The stories are repetitious and cosy-talk) happens, I have stopped going. Probably I with endless chases to find each other. Not to be unfair am just getting old, but I do prefer to eat my own food to Willis, Dalgaard stated that there were other writers and after a full day of discussing and socializing, I am he would force to use a pencil for writing their next mostly looking forward to sitting down and reading a novel first, as the pc and the printer seems to have made book… For some reason, the Filk singing, the dinner so many writers forget to economize with their words. speeches and other assorted entertainment never made Wordage seems to be more important today than a clear its way into Danish convention tradition. It is “just” cut message. Willis´ novel should only have been 600 dinner. pages – there are much wasted space going nowhere, and in much detail, according to Dalgaard. This collected As a sharp awakening, the very first panel on the some approving nods from the audience, but Swedish Sunday morning was”Recent Trends in SF Novels” fan Johan Anglemark raised the point that readers of moderated by Danish translator and old timer fan Stig W today wants to immerse themselves into a novel, and Jørgensen, and having Swedish fan Carolina Gomez wants it to go on for a long time. Escapism is not just the Lagerlöf, and Danish fans Niels Dalgaard & Flemming ideas anymore, it is also the process itself, the actual time Rasch presenting – in detail – four new novels, and spent reading. discussing if/how they might be seen as part of a trend in Carolina Gómez Lagerlöf started the discussion about current SF. The four books were Connie Willis: Blackout/All Clear, Mark Hodden: Springheeled Jack, The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack by Mark Hodder. This is a steampunk novel from an alternate London Lauren Beukes: Zoo City, and China Mieville: Embassy Town. Luckily the panel was located in the café, so a about 1850, based on the legend of a man who assaulted women and then rapidly disappeared by jumping. The bunch of us could eat the cafe´s (nice) breakfast plate while listening to the introductions and presentations. story contains gene-manipulated birds, dogs who can deliver letters, flying velocipedes and of course Blackout/All Clear is 1.000 page long time travel story, zeppelins. The book is funny and the described London written by the new Grand Master of Science Fiction, and is vivid on the page. The characters are interesting and author of such important titles as Doomsday Book, To Say you don’t have to read the sequels. After the short Nothing of the Dog, and Passage. This new massive book is presentation a debate began whether or not we missed Steampunk. There is a large following now, quite details and stories unfolded in the course of the outside conventional fandom. Just like Aminé. Why do interview. they happen outside our cirkles? A surprising event was the appearance of Bjørn Larsen Flemming Rasch had been assigned Lauren Beukes’ Zoo at the con. He is the chairman of the Danish Jules Verne City which reads like a cyberpunk novel. It is a crime Society, and I usually never see him at a con, only at our story with a cyberpunk girl and animals as familiars, but specific Jules Verne events. But he had decided to come has no real sf elements. Since it is set in South Africa it and tell us all WHY Jules Verne is such a bad writer! can be said to be part of a trend where the story takes Very systematically Larsen went through the 10 place in other countries, like in many of Ian McDonald’s standard steps Verne used for all his novels, and showed books. It is a mixture of urban fantasy, cyberpunk and just how alike they all really are, whether they take place new weird, and reads like Tim Powers. The animals are on a boat, on the back of an elephant, under the sea, or in used as punishment for criminals; you cannot survive if space. Naturally we end up claiming that he cannot be the animal dies. THAT bad, the books are remembered by most of us as FUN. For in spite of this clear formula, the books grip us. Stig W. Jørgensen had read China Miéville’s Why? We do not know. A very entertaining talk! Embassytown, which was not New Weird but traditional, space operatic sf with FTL and life on other planets. The I have known Henrik Harksen for quite awhile now. He setting is used to discuss the philosophy of language, is our expert in things horror, and has his own fan- and the main protagonist is the language. The aliens publishing house where he publishes books in Danish have a concrete language and cannot lie, but with the aid and English in that genre. Quite interesting titles too. of the humans they develop a symbolic use of words. Finally I was able to attend a talk by him on “The Apparently is is a fun read, and I think I would like to Cthulhu at the End of the World”, in other words all read it. things Cthulhu and the Apocalypse. In a very clear manner, Harksen divided our perception of Ctulhu into As for trends, well the talk went in all directions here, two main sources: Lovecraft himself (as expressed in the but I do not mind, it is always interesting when good works themselves and in his letters etc), and that readers present - in detail - some new genre titles... presented by his publisher August Derleth of Arkham Press. It struck me how much the publisher can Then came the panel “The Fairy Tale in Modern Fiction”, influence the perception of a work, even without with GoH Ellen Datlow, Danish Film-buff Nicolas changing anything in the work themselves, just by Barbano and Danish writer Lars Ahn Pedersen to adding introductions and writing about the work. I also, moderate. They quickly shifted focus to just films, and as expected, learnt a lot I didn’t know about Ctulhu, began discussing all the various films that have Lovecraft, Arkham House, Derleth, and all the fans incorporated or paraphrased the fairy tale / the folk tale surrounding them. Now I need to find Lovecraft´s in the past 100 years. Of the recent trends, they talked letters.... about the spreading of feminism to this area, with more able women in the lead roles of the old tales (Like Red All in all, I found this Fantasticon very VERY good, and Riding Hood). Lars clinged to the Hero´s Journey Model, much better than the previous ones. There were things Datlow claimed that structure is overrated, and Barbano that didn’t function surprised me, but mostly I really listed 4 pages of movies up, shoving how each enjoyed this con. The Guests of Honour and all the other decennium had an significant increase in the sheer contributors were well chosen. And it was nice to meet number of films with folk tale themes. It was an everybody again! What happens next I do not know. entertaining panel, though examples from the films (and Flemming has mumbled something about not doing fewer of them in more depth) would have been nice. another con next year, OH THE HORROR !!, but hopefully a fannish miracle will happen and there will As a high point in the program came the GoH Interview.
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